Being an influential African American, free-born abolitionist, and suffragist, she used her art of poetry to bring forth the truth behind slavery. Like Harriet Beecher Stowe, Harper also uses sentimentalism in her literature to create a sense of connection between the poem and the reader. In her poem The Slave Mother, Harper uses hints of indignation as it vividly portrays the pain and suffering of the enslaved mother and her harrowing separation from her child. Harper writes “He is not hers”, referring to the child not being the enslaved mother’s but rather the property of a slaveowner. However, following that statement are words showing her biological connection to the child, which, would make the child hers if she were a free woman (Harper 1632). Harper also uses a direct address in The Slave Mother which can be read in the first line of the poem when she asks the rhetorical question, “Heard you that shriek?”. This quote is implied to be the shriek of a mother losing their child, which is something most mothers can relate to. Harper paints slavery as the enemy of motherhood. Her writing captures slavery as it suppressed and stripped women of their right to